Josef Newgarden was nearly untouchable as the IndyCar Series kicked off its season on the sunny streets of St Petersburg last weekend. The 33-year-old double champion surged to pole on Saturday, and that proved to be the primer. Newgarden established dominance in Sunday’s contest with his Team Penske Dallara-Chevrolet, leading 92 of 100 laps en route to claiming victory by 7.9s over the Arrow McLaren machine of Pato O’Ward.
It was Newgarden’s 30th career IndyCar victory, which broke a tie with Penske legend Rick Mears for 13th on the all-time wins list, and his third on the 1.8-mile, 14-turn temporary street circuit.
Although the Tennessee native won’t confess to winning in IndyCar being easy, this latest drive, which was also his first non-oval win since June 2022 at Road America, was about as close as it gets. “I don’t want to say it felt easy, but it felt really, really comfortable today,” said Newgarden. “I had a lot of fun. I sort of told myself early in the race, ‘I’m going. I’m not here
